London

After boarding the plane I quickly realized that (as a consequence of never being prepared/responsible for my well-being) did not write down the address for where I was supposed to stay in London or the phone numbers of the contacts I was meeting there. We got off the plane and I followed Devon and Evan on the subway. Devon had to take a different train at a certain point, so she left and I went with Evan to his hostel. Pretending to be a guest at the hostel, I used the 20 free minutes credit slip for their internet and found the address along with the phone number to call. I said goodbye to Evan for the first time in 10 days and went out to find a cab. After waiting on the street for about 20 minutes a friendly enough looking old man stopped and I gave him the address. It took him about 20 minutes to drive to the location, and it was pretty expensive, considering how much more the Pound is worth than the Euro.

When I got to the apartment I discovered that the doorbell was broken and no one was picking up their phones. I wound up standing outside for about another 20 minutes, yelling up to the windows “Jacob Goldstein,” who was in there, hoping someone would answer. I got a little desperate and decided to do something douchey and rang another person’s doorbell. By this time it was 1:30 AM and a man opened the door. He asked me where I was staying, then in a calm, reserved, though clearly agitated way expressed that I had woken up his three and five year olds and that it was completely inappropriate to ring doorbells at that time of the day. Then he asked me where I was staying and then asked me for my name. I asked why he needed to know it and he said that he was going to report this to the university. I wouldn’t give him my name because I wasn’t in the mood to be told on, and being tired and stressed, walked right passed him and up the stairs while calling back “good night” over my shoulder and that I was sorry for disturbing him. I did feel bad, but when you're standing outside after traveling all day and have to go to the bathroom you sometimes need to do things like ring doorbells at ungodly hours. I saw a few Wash U students on the way up the stairs and then Jacob who greeted me. I went to sleep shortly after.

The next day I went with Jacob and Andie (the girl we were staying with) to the British Museum. I’d been anticipating visiting this place for a long time since I learned about the Elgin Marbles. The museum itself is very beautifully made. The artifacts inside are a compilation of all the things the British stole over the centuries from the countries they dominated. I walked into one room and immediately see the Rosetta Stone surrounded by a throng of people. They have quite the impressive collection of Egyptian artifacts and mummies. But the best part for me of course was seeing the Elgin Marbles.

Statue thought to be Aphrodite

I learned in an Art History class last year about the dispute between Greece and Britain concerning the marbles. Now that Athens has the glorious Acropolis Museum, they want their marble back, but Britain refuses to give it back, and they sum up their reason on a kid-friendly plaque outside the Parthenon room:

Really..?

As a side note, it's interesting to be writing this post as I sit in a hostel in Athens having just seen the Parthenon and the outside of the Acropolis Museum. Britain should give those marbles back. They belong here. We walked around for a little longer and saw some other pretty amazing things, then left feeling satisfied. Andie left and Jacob and I got lunch at a pizza place. Then, not quite knowing how to see London in a day and a half took the sightseeing bus tour around the city. It was a good tour with a solid tour guide. We got off the bus in front of Buckingham Palace and tried getting into the Queen's art gallery exhibit. But as we stood in line an old man who worked for the gallery walked right up to us and told us that it wasn't worth the money because it's just pictures for the time being, not paintings. We thought it was pretty funny that one of the docents would tell customers that the exhibit wasn't worth it, and it reminded me of that scene in Phantom of the Megaplex with Movie Mason (start clip at 1:00).

We continued to go around the city and ended up at the National Gallery. This museum was great and I got to see many more pieces of art. Then we embarked on the greatest part of the trip. I hadn't eaten meat for about two and a half months at this point, so we researched a kosher restaurant in Golder's Green and took a subway for about a half hour and got there. To our happy surprise, Golder's Green happened to be a street that was all kosher restaurants. I was jovial. We bought a big hamburger for an appetizer, then went two restaurants down and I got matzah ball soup and a schnitzel sandwich. After that we went to a market and bought some cold cuts, and since Purim was around the corner I bought a lot of hamentaschen. It was fantastic and was really the icing on the cake for this Spain/London adventure. We were pretty tired by that point and to my recollection went back to Andie's for the night.

The next day we took the subway and Jacob bought a theater ticket to see Ghost. It was hilarious listening to him order the ticket, because his love for theater comes through like an excited little boy at a toy store. After that we got a tour of the Globe Theater, Westminster Abbey and Parliament. Can two people be more touristy? My flight back to Dublin was fast approaching and after Parliament we went back to the apartment to get my stuff. I said goodbye to Jacob and went back to the airport and flew home with Devon. Thus I have finally finished chronicling Spain and London more than a month after the fact. Hopefully my memory served me well.